


Price

by orphan_account



Category: The Yogscast
Genre: Artsy Space Whatever, Dream Sequence, Gen, Gore, Stream of Consciousness, Surreal, dream - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-09
Updated: 2015-09-09
Packaged: 2018-04-19 22:11:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4762865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The price of heartlessness is a hefty one, and must be paid in the end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Price

**Author's Note:**

  * For [metalmeisje](https://archiveofourown.org/users/metalmeisje/gifts).



> (For metalmeisje, inspired (vaguely?) by their Voidtape concept/AU that is really fuckin' cool. ~~also inspired by the fact that they are a sweet nerd but shh that's a _secret_~~ )
> 
> This is definitely an experimental piece, and I haven't written present progressive text for a while. Bear with me! ^^
> 
> (Companion art piece: http://ayveena.tumblr.com/post/128704460085/he-tilts-his-head-in-consideration-the-liquid )

He finds himself wandering through constellations one night. He doesn't question why he's there; it doesn't seem to matter. He simply is, and he knows he has somewhere to be.  
  
He rounds a planet, brushing through the rings of dust with idle fingers, and sees the outlines of familiar silhouettes lit by the moons and stars.  
  
Names don't seem attainable, but he knows them like he knows the stars themselves. A red dwarf and a bright white star, compressed into forms laden with helmets and goggles and clothes.   
  
They wave, shining ever brighter, and continue away like comets. 

He knows they are friends.

He takes a step to follow them and feels as if his lungs are filling up with water. He coughs to clear them, a hacking broken thing, and something falls from his lips.

There is a piece of the void in his cupped palms.

It spikes something within him that is not fear, something unfathomable, and with every new step he finds himself wheezing more with it.  
  
He finds himself coughing black out of his lungs more and more the closer he gets to his friends, thin streams of sparkling shadow dripping from his lips like liquid galaxies.  
  
He keeps going. He can't stop.

He doesn't know _why_.  
  
One foot in front of another, he follows, exhaustion sapping down limbs that seem to be withering by the moment.

He can't lose them; he knows that. He knows somehow.

He's faltering, moving slow as a nightmare, and his friends grow so far away that the void swallows them, their voices swirling into distortion and then silence. The white noise of their laughter runs through his head like a spiral galaxy.  
  
He doesn't know if he's going straight now, but it doesn't frighten him. He doesn't think about it.  
  
He stumbles on, body protesting against the pull of the syrupy air, and the void cracks before him with the sound of a running river.   
  
He stops.  
  
A chasm opens and yawns, blocking his progress, somehow emptier and darker than the deep blackness of the void.   
  
"Are you willing?" The void asks, from everywhere and nowhere, his friends' voices carrying on its sighing breath, and he throws himself down the rabbit hole before he can even think.  
  
The galaxies vanish as the sky is swallowed, the depths swallowing him down into something that feels like gas but moves like syrup, lazy and unidentifiable.  
  
He gasps as something sharp and silver cuts into his chest, burning like wildfire, but he finds that it doesn't hurt any more when the shadow drips from him.  
  
Something comes away, something falls into his hands, and his vision hazes over for a fragile moment.  
  
"It will be easier now," the void hisses, and he stares down at his own heart, the star-scattered black sinew of his torn veins.  
  
It's a wretched thing, cold as frozen earth, and he finds that he no longer cares for it.  
"What will?" He asks, turning over the flesh in his hands to find jagged ebony crystals growing from his every artery. It hurts, somehow, a phantom pain he almost feels but doesn't truly grasp.  
  
The void laughs, a whisper and a scream, and he finds himself sinking in the ink of it.  
  
It's almost comforting, lukewarm and somehow safe, and it drinks him in like he's water.  
  
"We will not tell you what you already know."  
  
He watches his skin turn pale as whitewater against the curls of absence on his skin, and the stars etch themselves into his pores. His heart slips through his fingers and is swallowed.  
  
"Am I meant to be afraid?"  
  
The void does not answer, but it shifts with a gust of sighing breath.  
  
He sinks to his chest, and looks up into the endless expanse of cold indifference as the cavity of his chest is filled with thick shadow and starlight.  
  
"Am I dreaming?" He asks.  
  
The void shifts again, swirling in patterns of shadow. "Perhaps."  
  
He tilts his head in consideration, the liquid darkness drawing him down an afterthought. "You don't give a straight answer."  
  
The void chuckles with a thousand voices and stills into echoing silence.  
  
"Neither do you," it sighs, and something almost like hurt lances through him like a reopened wound.  
  
"Am I not asking the right questions?"  
  
"You are," it pauses as if considering, the quicksand shadow brushing his arms, "and you aren't."  
  
It reaches his neck and he blinks, turning his head to see the miles of dying stars that circle him. The light is fading, all but the blue shimmer of his own eyes.

It's enough.  
  
"What will happen to me?"  
  
"Nothing more than the inevitable."  
  
He breathes out a sigh, and the void seems to shiver.  
  
"Was that a comfort to you?" It inquires, still inching up his form.  
  
He laughs, and it's swallowed the moment it leaves his lips. "In a way."  
  
It soaks up his skin and pours into his mouth, only his ears and eyes above the syrup-thick shadow.  
  
"I do not know if I am to be glad of your acceptance."  
  
He tries to speak again but can't, his throat filled with liquid nothing that eats his words away.  
  
"Fall from your stars again, spaceman," the void says, and swallows the last of him.  
  
Xephos wakes up with a start, tangled in sheets and the cold weight of reality.

He touches his tongue against his teeth and still tastes shadow, and his eyes grow wet with tears he doesn't feel.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't think I've ever used the word he this much in my /life/


End file.
